


stellar flares

by cerisylia (kytaen)



Category: Ensemble Stars! (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Ryuseitai, Zine, zine fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-17
Updated: 2019-07-17
Packaged: 2020-06-28 11:52:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19811743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kytaen/pseuds/cerisylia
Summary: Tetora knows, his RYUSEI BLACK outfit is special. It's made by Taishou, after all; how can he not love it? But black can't fill holes. RYUSEITAI can't be where Tetora can achieve his dream. And Tetora—he can't be RED, either.He's so, so, far away from being red.(Written for « Cantare », an Ensemble Stars! song zine.)





	stellar flares

**Author's Note:**

> written for « cantare: an enstars song zine »~ my song was five-colored☆shooting star!!!!!, and i tried my best to incorporate as many lyrics into it as i could. please check out the free zine at [@enstsongszine](https://twitter.com/enstsongszine), there's a lot of amazing works in there!

_shooting star, in the moment—_

_—continue to burn, this tireless spirit_

It burns—up, up, up in the atmosphere, a bright speck of worn-out planet giving its last breath of energy to shine. Chiaki feels his eyes gravitating to it; it’s almost like déja-vu, this shooting star, reminiscent of the one that had fallen past his hospital room window when he was young.

He swallows. “Kanata,” he says, faintly—Kanata turns his head and blinks. He’d been watching the shooting star, too.

“Yes?”

Chiaki grabs Kanata’s hands, tightly, in his own. To the wishing star up above, to Kanata, or maybe to the entire world, all the citizens living on this blue-and-green planet—or maybe to Chiaki himself, he doesn’t know. He may never know. But he takes a breath in and with his heart in his throat and wishing wishing _wishing_ —

“Please… show me what real justice is.”

_Let me be able to fight for it._

☆ 

**_supernova:_ ** _when a star, near the end of its time, explodes into stardust, and new stars are born from the spark-shower_

When Tetora sets eyes upon his _RYUSEITAI_ outfit for the first time, the first thing he thinks of is _Taishou made this… that means I have to treasure it…!_

The second thing he thinks is how far away it is to being _red_.

“So! How do you guys like it!” Taichou—Chiaki’s eyes are on full-dial sparkle as he holds up his uniform, his brilliant red uniform, up to the sun. “As expected of Kiryu’s handiwork, haha!”

Beside him, Midori lets out a low grumble, a “do I _have_ to wear this flashy outfit all the time… I’m so depressed…”. Shinobu seems pleased; Tetora’s never seen Shinobu smile so much, given how private and drawn-in Sengoku-kun seemed to be when they first met. Shinkai-senpai, too, wears a relaxed, content expression—though it would be strange _not_ to see Kanata wearing such an expression, Tetora believes that his senpai also holds a certain fondness for the outfit, and its sheer blueness.

“So?” Chiaki keeps beaming expectantly, everything about him screaming _how do you think do you like it do you love it!!!!!_

“I-I like it very much, ossu!” Tetora pipes up; Chiaki laughs and claps Tetora on the shoulder. It’s not entirely a lie. He did love it—it was Taishou’s work, Taishou’s blood sweat and tears, how could he not? But every time he thumbs the fabric, catches a glimpse of his sleeves when he raises his arm up, there’s a twinge of something—something guilty and sour like a forlorn sadness nagging at his heartstrings, tasting distractingly like _I wish I had red._

Taishou’s unit— _Akatsuki_ —was red. It wasn’t the only reason why Tetora had tried, so hard, to get in, but it may as well be a deciding factor, one that tipped the balance from one end to another. Red meant strength. Red meant courage. Red meant a fullness, a richness, an abundance and a rush of life like hearts pumping blood—red was something that could fill holes. 

(Holes, just like the one Tetora feels must be in the center of his heart.)

“Do you like green, Midori-kun?” he asks, during break. They’d been working on _sentai hero_ poses and catchphrases for the past hour; in the sky, the horizon has already started dragging the sun down. Midori’s sitting cross-legged on the grass, with red cheeks and sweat dripping down his locks of hair. Looking handsome even through a face of reluctance and tiredness, Tetora can’t help but feel just the slightest bit of jealousy bite his sides. 

“Arghh… don’t talk to me yet, Tetora-kun… I’m so tired I seriously feel as if I’m going to die…”

“N-no good, Midori-kun! No good!” Shinobu hands Midori and Tetora each a water bottle, still glistening from remnants of melted ice. Tetora takes a swig gratefully; the ice-cold liquid immediately cools down and relaxes every muscle in his body.

“Ahaha, Midori-kun. Don’t pass out on us, okay?” Tetora says, wiping his mouth with his sleeve. “A~ah, that hits the spot!”

“I don’t want to pass out now… not when the last memory I’ll ever have is me doing embarrassing catchphrases,” Midori whinges, setting down his water bottle. “And… what was that, Tetora-kun?”

Tetora waves his hands. “Ah, nothing, nothing at all!” If Midori-kun didn’t hear it the first time, it was better not to dredge it up again. After all, only Tetora is insecure with his color, it’s his own problem… _Yeah. It wouldn’t be manly if I got people too involved. To be a man among men—that’s what I’m aiming for, ossu!_

“Ah… something about… the color green?”

Tetora’s inner monologue quiets. Putting his thoughts back into the furthest, deepest corners of his mind, he presses his lips, and hands, together in wait.

“I… don’t know,” Midori confesses. “I mean, I’m only here because Morisawa-senpai pushed me to join the basketball club… and then he went ‘you’re Green! It’s perfect!’ and now I’m here in _RYUSEITAI_ … Honestly, just how did I even end up here…”

“But do you like it?” Tetora catches himself leaning forward. “I’m just curious!”

Midori lifts his head up, and… _watches_ Tetora. It’s rather unsettling, especially because the other is good-looking, with his brows drawn in a perplexed knot. Tetora feels a chill, and draws back a bit. “Sigh… if I didn’t like it, I would probably be really upset if my name was “green”, don’t you think…”

“You’re, you’re right, Midori-kun,” Tetora nods, hoping that would be the end to their awkward conversation. Midori goes back to being extremely interested in the cap of his bottle. “What about you, Sengoku-kun? Do you like yellow?”

“Uh, ah, you were talking to me? Erm…” Shinobu frowns. “Well, I do not despise the color yellow, not at all, de gozaru. In fact, there are some frogs that are yellow, did you know that? But if I had to say if I loved it, maybe it’s something that will take some time. You see, ninjas are the intelligence collectors of the dark… de gozaru. We work in the darkness, so yellow would otherwise stand out a lot.”

Midori picks up his empty bottle, and stands up.

“What about black, Tetora-kun?” Shinobu asks. “Do you like your color?”

There’s a hammer in Tetora’s chest.

What _about black, really._

“Nghh… well I really wanted to be in _Akatsuki_ , but I failed the document review… _Akatsuki’s_ red, you know! I like it a lot! But black…” _Is black even a color, really?_ “Like you, Sengoku-kun, maybe I’ll get used to it,” he grins, a mouth forming a smile but a frown set behind it, a hidden door within a closet. “It’s supposed to be,” and Tetora clenches his fist, “‘the proof of diligence!!!’—or something, right, Sengoku-kun.”

A laugh. Tetora turns his head to see Chiaki coming towards them. “Nagumo!” he shouts, as he gets ever closer, “your catchphrase suits you! It sounded so good, tears welled up in my eyes!”

Midori sighs as he sits back down, not even glancing at Chiaki’s arrival. “Tetora-kun, if you became the leader, that’ll be great, I think… if you need help overthrowing him, I would be willing to...”

“Oh?” Chiaki raises his eyebrows. “Is this a battle between colors? Takamine, you~ I object to violence! Ah, but a challenge like this is very hero-like, isn’t it!” Facing Tetora’s direction, he smiles. “Well, Red isn’t that easy to inherit! I had a hard time myself… but if it’s you, Nagumo, I believe you can do it! So keep getting stronger, and one day this color may just be yours.”

Tetora glances upwards, at Chiaki. At the reddish-golden glow of the sun haloing Chiaki’s head. He’s not sure if he could ever reach the point of being anything close to being a leader within the short span of a year, but… 

(In the moment, nothing mattered except for iron in the blood—black—and the blood itself, red, burning.)

Mustering the courage, a hint of a growl in his voice, Tetora declares, “I accept your challenge, Taichou…!”

Chiaki’s laugh is faint in the mutedness, the blur of sound, that follows. Still, Tetora forces the words out of his mouth like a stunning explosion of something long forgotten inside his heart. “I’ll fight for it, and earn the color red, if it’s the last thing I do in _RYUSEITAI!_ ”

“That’s the spirit, Nagumo! Should we shake on it then, haha!” Chiaki extends a hand towards him. Tetora watches that hand, that hand with the white tape wrapped around its fingers, scuffs at the base of its knuckles.

He takes it, and lets it pull him up.

☆

“The five of us together, we are _RYUSEITAI!_ ”

That’s the last thing Tetora remembers when he exits the stage; in fact, it’s the only thing he remembers, is willing to remember. His arms feel heavy, his legs like lead; his head is full of bees buzzing incessantly and his heart is drumming non-stop.

_Huff… huff…_

“That was fun, wasn’t it?” Chiaki’s voice pokes through the angry slurry of noise in his head.

 _Fun…? It wasn’t fun at all!_ Tetora wants to scream out.

“It was _horrible,_ ” Midori stresses, body giving into the wall. “There were… so many people… I’m so tall, and my color’s bright _green_ so I stood out a lot, and I even fell over… I’m so depressed, I hate this…!”

“Come on, Takamine, it wasn’t that bad!” Chiaki reassures. Then looks over to Shinobu. “Sengoku, are you alright! You look rattled.”

“Taichou-dono… I couldn’t complete my mission, in which I will apologize with everything I have…” Shinobu is shaking from head to toe, and by the looks of it, trying his hardest not to cry. (Tetora can relate; he’s biting back the urge to, too.) “I cannot call myself a ninja after this, but p-please, accept this bow!”

“Woah there, Sengoku! No need to bow before me! Ah, don’t look at me like that, okay…?” Chiaki waves in Kanata’s direction. “Kanata! Come over here. As _RYUSEITAI’s_ leader, I have important matters to address.”

“Do I ‘need’ to, Chiaki…?”

“You must, yes! It’s a meeting between comrades, a hero’s meeting!”

“My skin is all ‘dried up’ like a starfish on land after the performance… I am ‘hot’, and I do not ‘like it’, Chiaki. So if you will ‘excuse me’, I shall be at the fountain, _puka, puka~_ ”

“Wait a minute, Kanata…!” With an air of resignation, Chiaki presses a hand to his forehead, then with a swift recovery, he forms a fist. “Alright! Let’s talk with just us three, my comrades! Kanata has been working hard, and being given so many new responsibilities as a vice-captain must have stressed him out. But! I’ll relay everything to him afterward. Nagumo!”

The sudden mention of his name shoots an electric current through Tetora’s spine. He sits up, straight as a ramrod. “O-ossu. What’s up, Captain?” 

“You’ve been unusually quiet today. Let me know how you’re feeling, okay?”

 _How I’m… feeling?_ A residual anger, a silent frustration, remains within his veins—and it’s not something he can give up quite so easily. “It was a mess, just like Midori-kun said.”

“Aw, Nagumo, it wasn’t—”

“We tripped over each other,” Tetora says, growing ever more frustrated, voice building up a crescendo. “Sengoku-kun had a hard time coming up onto stage. Midori-kun didn’t sing half of it. Shinkai-senpai did his own thing, and I—I couldn’t even say the lyrics right, much less do the choreography correctly—just how was it not bad?”

“Nagumo.” Chiaki is stern. “Takamine. Sengoku. All heroes face hurdles sometimes, enemies that can’t be fought off alone. This is just the start of _RYUSEITAI’s_ hero story; we’re at the introduction phase of it, the opening scene to a tokusatsu show!” He beams. “And maybe it _was_ messy, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t good at all! See… if we can make even one person smile from the audience, it’s worth the pain, the fight.”

But Tetora isn’t having it. His legs still recall the not-so-distant memory of falling down in the form of the scrape on his knee. His vocal cords still remember all the words he’d sang at the wrong time. His heart still feel the pangs of despair hitting it, again and again, as _RYUSEITAI_ bumbled through the performance blindly, all the way up ‘til the end. “Heroes… When I joined _RYUSEITAI_ , I was expecting something strong, a strength I could be proud of. Not this, this hero game!” Tetora whips around, sees Midori’s tired face, Shinobu’s dark expression of worry mixed with fear. Chiaki’s pained one, though he hides the pain well—Tetora swallows his pride, and the bead of guilt in his throat. _I’m sorry, Taichou._ “Taichou. Sorry if this is disrespectful or somethin’, but can you please hear me out?”

Chiaki nods. “Go ahead, Nagumo. Hit me, get angry at me, whatever you’ve got, I’ll take it! Let it all out if you must!”

Tetora takes a deep breath, heart remaining at a million beats per second. “Let me ask you something. 

You brought together five people who are nothing alike, to fight against an enemy we don’t even know—Taichou,

_what are we even fighting for?!”_

☆

_burning bright red, life-giving sun_

Chiaki thinks that sometimes, he thinks that too.

It was easy—too easy—to say the word “justice”. Even if he says it so frequently: words and wishes don’t become _true_ the more you utter them. _I want to revive RYUSEITAI—_ but who’s going to help you— _I want us to fight for justice—_ but what is that justice you claim you hold?

Sometimes, the very idea of “justice”, the very notion of his ideals, taste coppery in his mouth. Like blood. Red. Flowing. Seas of it.

( _The blood, all that blood, like a never-ending river from ocean to sea to dirt it keeps on flowing and_ “Chiaki...” Kanata’s voice calls out, in the murky blue. Chiaki looks down to his hands and it is red all over; he looks at Kanata and it’s red all over, _This isn’t justice_ he wants to scream, but wasn’t this a funny thing to say when he’d put his faith in the fist he clenches in the name of justice and when he opens that fist up

there turns out to be a knife?)

 _Saying ‘I believe something good will happen’ is as effective as wishing on a shooting star,_ a voice echoes in his head as Chiaki puts on his school uniform; lifts up his green tie. One of his seniors had said that, a year back, and he wasn’t wrong—having a wish is the very beginnings of everything, but if there’s no intent towards making that wish come true, dreams stay dreams. 

( _He’s swimming in them, his thoughts. Blinding his view like a waterfall crashing over the mouth of a cave.)_

Chiaki shakes his head, dispersing water from a water-logged mind, and in that moment everything stills save for his beating heart. Still alive. Still warm, still breathing.

“Alright!” he shouts, to no one in particular. “First, off to the 1-A classroom. There’s someone—er… Takamine Midori… yes, Takamine, if I don’t scout you first for the basketball club then you’re definitely going to get snatched away by the other sports clubs. Then there’s… hm. Kiryu told me of that first year he was looking after? Nagumo Tetora?”

Someone bumps into him just then, papers flying everywhere. “Woah, be careful of where you’re going!” Chiaki says, as the first year picks up his papers, a… _shuriken?_ in his other hand.

“I-I… sorry! I must leave at this moment, de gozaru!” The first year dashes around Chiaki at breakneck speed, disappearing down the hallway.

“Don’t run down the halls, okay?” _Or else you’d get admonished by Hasumi, hahah!_ But Chiaki blinks for a few minutes, with a word on his tongue he never says, but knows it belonged there, perfectly:

_Yellow._

“The five of us, we are _RYUSEITAI_ !” he now says, stepping back and watching four colors glow before him—blueblackyellowgreen—and take the stage. Midori, as timid as he was in second year; Kanata, who had joined _RYUSEITAI_ on a promise. Shinobu, who hid behind Midori as he sang softly (even though he had such a pleasant voice!). Tetora, rushing forward at all the wrong places and singing the second verse when they should have been on their first.

Chiaki keeps singing—like he’s always have. He can feel the heaviness, however, clinging to every part of his body—the silent hisses of _it’s not going to work nothing will get better it’s going,_

_to be the same, as last year,_

_I’ll sing then!_ Chiaki thinks, furiously, as he continues to belt out his parts with increased vigor. Looking down on the audience, looking for that one smile, that one star shining, a sign that their efforts have not yet been wasted— _I’ll fight, even if I’m the only one fighting!_

“Thank you, everyone!”

It’s an hour after the performance, their first big performance as _RYUSEITAI_. They had come off the stage, him leading the way, Kanata walking behind him, the first years trailing behind Kanata with their heads down, silent. Chiaki tries to hide, shove something away—it’s a guilty feeling perhaps—but it’s fighting against the current, and he’s scared it might win.

Tetora is on edge.

So is everyone else—Midori has always been honest, sometimes terrifying honest, with his complaints; Kanata has since gone to the fountain to wind down; Shinobu is mumbling something along the lines of “how can I call myself a ninja if I can’t even complete this mission Taichou-dono entrusted to me!”—but Tetora, straightforward, so much energy in that body of his (but never sure how much or when to let that energy out), is the only one who speaks up, who holds the truth in everything he says:

“Taichou. You brought together five people who are nothing alike, to fight against an enemy we don’t even know!”

 _Ah,_ Chiaki thinks, _there it is. The truth._ A part of him finds some sort of halcyonic relief, almost, in Tetora’s display of honesty. Is this all going to end up like last year? He’d tried to bring everyone together that year, even when tensions grew and personalities, motivations clashed and banged and everything caught on fire and burned the stage down, down, down…

_Isn’t this the same? Bringing these five together, selfishly, for the sake of my dream?_

_Am I doing the right thing?_

_Is this really justice…?_

“Taichou, what are we even fighting for?!”

(But among the audience—maybe the rest of _RYUSEITAI_ were too focused on the stage, on their careful steps, on staying faithful to the lyrics and the songs they sang—maybe only Chiaki noticed, but in the crowd down below,

a single smile, shining.

Chiaki wants to see that same smile light up every member of _RYUSEITAI_ ’s faces, too. _As long as I’m Red..._ )

Chiaki takes a step forward with his right leg, and throws his hand out—a pose he’d mimicked from the heroes of his childhood. “Why, it’s for justice, of course!” he starts… but stops himself. Softens his movements, the intensity of his voice, and at the edges of his eyes.

“For our dreams, Nagumo.”

☆

_as many as the number of wounds, (the green flames)_

Dreams were something that only existed in a faraway land, a land Midori neither lived in, nor dared to trespass. Waking up at eight in the morning to the sun’s rays slicing through the blinds, whatever bittersweet dream he’d had five minutes before had since scattered into dust and demise, forever forgotten and lost in time.

“Ugnnhh,” he mumbles, hitting the alarm on his phone repeatedly with a weak hand—and missing each time. “I don’t want to get up…” 

He staggers up out of the bed in a stilted limp of sorts, one hand clutching at his stuffed sheep plushie, the other blindly skimping across the walls as he makes his way out the door. And like that, he’s out of the store and into the wide, wide world, off to yet another day at Yumenosaki Academy.

The halls, maze-like, greet him with familiarity; the silver plate above his classroom door glints _hello._ Midori takes a minute to stare at the _1-A_ embossed onto the sign—he wonders if he keeps staring at it, will time pass quicker? Would the _1_ change to _2_ to _3_ and in the blink of an eye his high school life would draw to a close with no hassle?

He thinks a lot of things. Wishful things, things that never made sense. 

_Everything hurts—_ that didn’t make a lot of sense either, but at least, it’s something he’s sure of.

“Ossu, good morning Midori-kun! Ehh? Midori-kun, earth to Midori-kun,”

Tetora taps him on the shoulder. “Did ya fall asleep on the spot standing up or something?”

Midori groans as he enters the classroom, ever reluctant. “That would be… embarrassing… if you ever catch me doing that, Tetora-kun, shake me awake, okay…?”

Tetora laughs. “I think sleeping while standing up would be quite a feat! Doesn’t it sound manly?”

“How even… ah, now my brain hurts from trying to imagine it…”

“See,” Tetora crosses his arms, closes his eyes, and leans on the wall. “It’s like being a watchman! Getting some shut-eye while your ears stay alert to any intruders, and then suddenly—bam!—you knock them out! Like this,” Tetora explains, hands forming a fist punching outwards.

“Heh, is Tetora-kun sleep-talking?” Hinata asks, slipping into the classroom. “Oh—good morning, handsome-looking classmate—Takamine-kun, right right?”

Midori lays his head onto the table, smothering his face into his arms.

“Don’t worry, you’re handsome too,” Hinata says, “hand~somee!”. Presumably to Tetora standing to his right. Midori couldn’t care less who the conversation was directed to, as long as it wasn’t him: voices are blurring and chiming in together and the door is opening and closing and there’s footsteps like the _pitter-patter_ of dewdrop-morning rain.

_If it were raining hard enough, maybe school could be cancelled… ah, why didn’t that happen today?_

“Ah! Midori-kun,” Tetora’s voice is ringing above his head, “did you do your homework?”

At the mention of _homework,_ Midori lets out a distressed mumble of “I mean… I did it, but I’m pretty sure half of it is wrong…”

“Ah, really.” Midori can’t be a hundred-percent sure, but— _it’s there, isn’t it?_ his brain asks, like little spears attacking his frail heart, _they hide it well but it’s there, isn’t it, the disappointment?_ “Oh, Hajime-kun, good timing! How did your homework go?”

Midori doesn’t bother lifting his head up, nor does he look out the window hoping for a late rain-spell. He already knows, _it’s going to be a long day today._

“My comrades! I’ve got exciting news for all of you!”

_Yep… a long day._

“Taichou, what is it?” Tetora asks, a little less forward, a little more tentative than usual. Usually he’d be raring to go with whatever came at him; that was the kind of soul Tetora possessed, snapping up at every opportunity that could make him stronger, wasn’t it? Then again, Midori thinks, Tetora’s “strength” is like Chiaki’s “justice”... a bit ambiguous, a definition only they knew.

“I’ve been thinking all week,” Chiaki begins, “so I contacted a few people to make it happen. _RYUSEITAI_ will be doing a charity live for the kids at the nearby hospital—now now, Takamine, don’t sulk, it’s a great opportunity for us! So! If everyone could pitch in their own ideas towards the choreography and such,” he unfurls a long sheet of paper onto the ground, “that’ll be great.”

Midori stops mid-sulk and mid “ _I want to go home…_ ” to exchange a glance with the other first years. Tetora nods. “Uh, Taichou…” Tetora starts.

“Hm, what’s that, Nagumo? Speak up if you want to say something!”

“Can you elaborate on this live, Taichou? We don’t know anything about it, so even if we were to pitch in ideas, there’s no theme to go off of, y’know? And why is this live so sudden? We just did a live a few days ago, didn’t we?”

“Tetora is ‘right’, you know,” Kanata comes in, a finger at the side of his face. “You are acting ‘strange’.”

“Huh? Something is strange?” Chiaki looks up from his markers and the paper. “What’s wrong, everyone? Why are you all looking at me that way! Do I have crumbs on my face?!”

“Well, it is not a ‘bad’ strange, it is just ‘not like you’. The children are still ‘inexperienced’, you know,” Kanata hums, sounding far away. Midori wishes he could wander off to wherever Kanata’s mind was going. _I didn’t want to go to practice today, anyway, but Morisawa-senpai said it was important…_

“Um… Buchou—”

“Uh-uh, Takamine, what did I tell you?”

Midori mutters a _my god…_ under his breath, then brings his voice back up to the surface. “ _Taichou…_ we’re used to you pulling us relentlessly forward, and all, but… doesn’t this feel kinda reckless? I mean, we just had a really bad live… We aren’t ready for another one this soon; we should all just go home and recover… and yet you’re still smiling and planning things for the unit as usual so that it’s to the point of being annoying… Do you not have a sense of the situation at all…?” 

“Ah, I was going to explain it when Nagumo brought it up!” Chiaki hands Midori a marker; Midori doesn’t take it. “Just like you said, Takamine, our last live wasn’t exactly what we’d hoped for, but that’s why we need to stand up again and try again! This is your second chance to prove yourselves! Heroes don’t usually get another chance to defeat the villain, you know. That’s why second chances are so precious!”

“What a pain… Charging forward, without a… do you even have a plan in mind?”

“Well, I do have a basic roadmap! But y’see, that’s where this,” Chiaki gestures to the roll of paper, “comes in! See, what I thought was, the reason our last live was like that was because we weren’t coordinated with each other. We didn’t have the same feeling of ‘justice’ running through our veins. Nagumo, you asked what we were fighting for, didn’t you! So with this live,” Chiaki uncaps his marker—no, _markers_ —and draws, in thick bold strokes, a title. “I want to work with you guys to better coordinate our movements with each other. And to do that, we need to become _RYUSEITAI_ —that is, we need to unite as a single star shining in the night sky!”

On the white of the paper, a contrast, a sudden explosion of color: _5-COLORS LIVE_.

“Taichou,” Tetora scratches his head, “slow down, I didn’t quite catch where you’re going with this… so what’s with this piece of paper then? What does this have to do with anything?”

“To create that feeling of unity, Nagumo, we’re going to each incorporate something into the live! That way, we can understand each other better and we’ll be more unified than ever before! Don’t worry too much about it, just follow what your heart says! You can leave the rest of the planning to me and Kanata.”

Kanata returns from his reverie. “Me too… Chiaki?” 

Chiaki laughs. “Of course, Kanata! 

“Can I pass…?” Midori asks, having already grabbed his bag in a _one-foot-out-the-door_ stance. He’s tired, tired of everything—doing another live so soon, if at all, is out of the question, and simply, not worth risking the precious time he had to himself for. “This sounds bothersome and messy—I don’t think it will work that well either…” _It’ll probably just turn out like the last one, anyway._

“Nonsense,” and suddenly Chiaki has an arm wrapped around Midori’s shoulders (he tries shrugging them off, to no avail) and ushering him back to where everyone stood. “I guarantee that this plan will work! No, I’m sure it will work, we have five people!”

“And…?”

“Five are better than one!”

“Sigh…” Midori puts his bag down, takes up a marker and squints at it with a doubtful gaze. “I don’t even know what to put down, this is all so sudden… ahh, my brain hurts… it’s easy for Sengoku-kun, see,” he points out to Shinobu circling “ninja jutsu!!” and drawing tiny shurikens around it, “because we all know he loves ninjas.”

Shinobu blushes, just a hint of it flushing his cheeks, and grins. “Midori-kun, you have a love for mascot characters, too, right? That can be your theme too, de gozaru.”

“Ooh, that’s right, Sengoku! See, it won’t be hard at all!” Chiaki agrees.

“Me loving mascot characters is entirely different from trying to put something related to it in a live,” Midori stresses. “We would trip over each other if we wore costumes… and it’s not like I can get everyone in the audience to come dressed up in costumes either…”

“Don’t overthink it, Midori-kun!” Tetora says. “I’m sure that if you keep thinking, you’ll find something!”

“Easy for you to say… huh…? Tetora-kun, you haven’t written anything of substance either—”

“I—I will!” Tetora snatches a marker out of the fray, starts scribbling something in purple. “See, I’ve written more than you!”

Kanata laughs, looking up from his fish drawing. “Tetora, do not ‘rush’, your words are all ‘squished’. They are like sardines in a ‘can’, hehe.”

“Sardines…?”

“Haha, everyone is having fun!” Chiaki says, his own red marker going places. “That’s good, good!”

Midori lifts his head just to frown. “What kind of definition of ‘fun’ do you have, Morisawa-senpai…” But even as he says this, he feels the sun warm at his back, the breeze ruffling his hair, every bit of his attention focused on his right hand, drawing—and in his peripheral vision, four other colourful streaks like flowers blooming on snow-white. Something, briefly, thumps in Midori’s chest—it would take a while for him to define the feeling, but for now, at least,

(Midori smiles down at the puffs of star-shaped mascot characters he’s drawn in a neat line.)

… it’s not so bad.

☆

_kick away the darkness (the yellow flames)_

The sun slips down the horizon, making little puddles of light on the cobblestone path. Shinobu liked these, the dapples cast by the tree shadows lining the sidewalks—a hop! A skip! A dash!—zipping around the sun-spots as if they were lava and the rest stable footing.

He was a ninja, after all: he's good at things like these. Evading enemies, skirting through the alleyways and forests unnoticed, uncovering secrets and obtaining secret intel to promptly deliver back to the masters.

So then, why did his last mission fail so miserably?

Shinobu kicks a stone, listens to it tip-tap and quietly rest on its side, as if giving its last breath, on the roadside. He picks it up, imagines throwing it like one of his shurikens—if he concentrated hard enough and flicked his wrist he knows he'd meet his target...!

(He throws it—mindful of his surroundings, of course. He didn't want to hit anyone.)

(It bounces off the nearby tree, one tree too early from his goal.)

"Nnn," he emits a subdued groan of frustration. No good, his mind was distracted! Being a ninja wasn't an easy task; there were constant troubles, challenges, new obstacles in his way. Neither was being an idol, or Sengoku Shinobu, 1-B first-year student. He'd known this, he'd known this, but...!

"Thunder," he whispers, to the frog in his bag (who now peeks its little knobbly head out at the sound of Shinobu's voice). "Tomorrow we're going to keep on working on the design plan," he says, as he keeps walking home, facing the sun and leaving the stone behind. "Because I love ninjas, I will be implementing something related to it to the live... de gozaru." He turns, forgetting himself, then catches what he was doing and shakes his head, taking off his backpack instead to look straight into Thunder's small beady eyes. "But do you think this is enough, de gozaru? Can I..." He hesitates. "Can I really bring the love of ninjas to the audience if I am always hiding?"

Thunder's black eyes seemed to hold infinite wisdom in that particular moment in time. But the frog says nothing.

Shinobu puts his bag back on. "It is hard to face that many people, you know, de gozaru," he continues. A gentle breeze wafts through the silent streets, silent save but the distant chatter among the shops, empty save but the foreign scents of the restaurants still open at this hour. (Silent, of course, because Shinobu is an expert at walking quietly.) "Ninjas report to their leaders, but they are often working alone. I do not mind being alone, but do you think, Thunder, that I am..."

The word "lonely" falls off his tongue.

"N-nevermind, Thunder. As a ninja, I must be straight to the point, just like the path of my shuriken, de gozaru! My mission right now is the only thing allowed to occupy my line of sight!" Shinobu clutches the handles of his bag tighter. "I will work hard at the "Five Colors Live", de gozaru... my comrades? Well... Midori-kun is tall and kind of intimidating, but it feels like we are connected on some levels... Tetora-kun has lots of energy; it is a good energy, I think.

"Captain-dono is loud and fiery, de gozaru—but he is a good person, he was the one that found me and asked me to join, after all... and Shinkai-dono is a bit strange, de gozaru, but he is very soothing, so..."

Shinobu hits his palm with his fist—suddenly, an idea. "Ohh, do you think they would let me jump through hoops lit on fire? No?" Shinobu squints at the little face of Peachy, who blinks as if it just woke up from a hazy dream. "Did you just shake your head at me, Peachy?"

Peachy squints right back, imitating a pleased smile.

"Nay! I say, Peachy, when did you become so sarcastic!" Shinobu's smile fades, back to a pressed line, as he looks up to the sky, at the melting sun.

"I hope it goes well," he says, maybe just to reassure himself, but it's nice to say it out loud. "No, it will go well—I will complete my mission this time with flying colors, de gozaru...!"

(He cuts a corner, with his small back to the sun, and slips into the darkness.)

☆

_speak with your fists (the black flames)_

Tetora kicks his leg out.

"Good," Kuro says, holding the punching pad in front of him and watching Tetora's movements with keen eyes. "Now firmer."

"Ossu, Taishou!" Tetora grips his hands into fists, breathes deeply through his nose. Kicks.

"Tetsu."

"Yes Boss?" Tetora wipes a gleam of sweat from his brow.

Kuro frowns. "You're off balance today. Anything troubling you?"

Tetora stands still in place, huffing. "Nothing's wrong! Or—even if something were wrong, I'm gonna face it head on, so don't worry!"

Kuro puts the pad down, and sits on the mat cross-legged. "If something is burdening you, we can't practice until we get to the root of it. Your kicks have become aggressive and heated, not controlled. We don't want that."

"Ossu," Tetora gives in, sitting down and facing Kuro. "'Cause karate is not s'pposed to feel like that, right, Taishou?"

Kuro nods.

"But..." Tetora grasps at his fingers and wrings his hands. "This is a battle I must fight alone—I don't want to drag you into this, Boss!"

Kuro shakes his head. "Fighting with force is not the right way, Tetsu. Hm. This is your own battle, you say? But think about this: how many people are you affecting by acting so strange?"

Tetora thinks back to morning class, where he'd been so out of sorts Kunugi-sensei had scolded him, and blanches. "I... I'm sorry if I caused inconvenience to you, Boss! I'll practice more to make up for it!"

Kuro sighs, but not without a hint of a smile. "Why don't you tell me what you can instead."

"Well... Taichou—uh, Morisawa-senpai, our unit leader—"

"Morisawa?"

"We're doing a live. _RYUSEITAI,_ that is."

"I see," Kuro says. "And what's so particular about this one that has you all worked up, Tetsu."

"We're supposed to incorporate somethin' relating to our passions into it, ossu." Tetora grabs at his knees unconsciously, as if steadying himself from leaning too far forward. "He didn't give us any specifics, and he said he's gonna take care of the rest, and—"

"Slow down, Tetsu." Kuro puts his hands up. "Breathe, and regain your focus."

 _What is the most important thing here?_ Kuro's voice echoes; though he never says it out loud Tetora hears it, loud and clear, in the back of his mind.

Tetora takes a deep breath. Focuses on only his hands touching his knees. Out. In. Tighten. Loosen.

Kuro's words drift back. Focus. Focus...

"I... probably want to put a karate move or something into it, right?"

"That's a question for yourself, Tetsu, not me."

"But you see—everyone is so different," Tetora stresses. "I dunno, I want this to work," especially given that their last live had collapsed like a dying star, "but d'you really think... Boss, you're the one who keeps telling me not to rush things, yeah?"

Kuro puts his chin on the palm of his hand. "It's a bit too early to do another live, I suppose I get where you're going—"

"Taishouuu I'm so happy you understand how I feel...!"

"—but Morisawa, that guy," Kuro goes on to say, "He might not look that reliable sometimes, but I trust he knows what he's doing."

Tetora looks at Kuro expectantly, as if to ask _elaborate...?_

Kuro props one knee up, and stands. "Coordination comes with practice. Syncing yourselves with the others down to your very breaths, your heartbeats. With practice, Tetsu, you'll make it."

"But _Akatsuki_ is really coordinated!" Tetora abruptly bursts out. Then, his voice catches in his throat, forcing things down: forcing things that could've, would've jumped out, all the way back down. Kuro raises an eyebrow slightly, but doesn't comment for a while.

Tetora notices too late that he is standing up, having shot up from the ground. Painfully embarrassed, _what was I even doing?!_ , he sits back down, wincing inside. _Boss must think I'm whining—if I'm to be a man among men I shouldn't whine, especially not in front of him!_

"Maybe we do look coordinated on stage, but that also came with practice, Tetsu." Kuro bends down, back to a kneel, and puts a reassuring hand on Tetora's shoulder. “I know you have your reservations, Tetsu, but we all start somewhere. No matter where you start, the most important thing is how you carry yourself, and that the people you surround yourself with will support you.”

Slowly, Tetora gets up on one knee, then the other, until he’s back up. Up here, towering over Kuro, Tetora still feels very small: there’s still some distance to cover, that’s for sure.

 _But save that for another day_ , Tetora thinks, sliding a foot in a clockwise, circular arc on the mat and forming a tight fist with both hands.

“Ready to continue?” Kuro’s lips form a smile.

“Ready as ever, Boss,” Tetora replies, just a speck of old confidence returning to his eyes.

☆

Tetora’s slumping a little when he walks to unit practice: barely discernible, but altogether _there_ , the withdrawal. He’s not sure what he’d do when he sees Chiaki again—Taishou wouldn’t tell on him; he was a man of his word—but Tetora feels nonetheless uneasy.

“You are looking ‘down’, Tetora. Are you ‘alright’?”

Tetora jolts. “Who—ah, Shinkai-senpai, you scared me!”

Kanata frowns, lifting up a dripping elbow and resting it on the brick. “Did I?”

“Ah, not that you’re scary or anything,” Tetora waves his hands, _you’re just hard to understand…._ he thinks, as Kanata smiles again, as if to say _“good, good~”_

More than anything, Tetora isn’t surprised that Kanata would be here—Kanata was always here—but rather, how his senior had reached out to him, and pointed out, pinpoint accuracy, that something about him was off. Kanata doesn’t really… talk to the first years. At least, not outside practice.

So what Tetora does next baffles himself as well.

Tetora purses his lips. “Can I…”

Kanata tilts his head.

It’s a breezy day, overcast. The swishing of trees, leaves brushing against each other; the sun filtering through the gaps the trees leave like glitter and light shedding off a disco ball. Both Tetora, sitting on the ground with his back against the fountain’s brick edge, and Kanata, still soaking in the water, are silent, as silent as the birds watching them back on the branches.

Then Kanata speaks up, out of the blue. “If you are down, Tetora, maybe you are just ‘hungry’. Eating fish might make you ‘happier’.”

Tetora turns his head. “No, it’s not that…”

“If something is ‘bothering’ you, it’s not good to keep it to yourself.”

 _Don’t you do the same thing, Shinkai-senpai?_ Tetora wants to say, but stops himself short of uttering even a word. This wasn’t something a man among men would do, being hypocritical of others.

Tetora can’t tell what Kanata is thinking, which makes the silence, and the not-silence, discomforting. “It’s kinda weird though. We don’t really talk usually—actually, you don’t do it with the other first years, either?”

“Heh…” Kanata closes his eyes knowingly. “I have not gotten ‘used’ to talking with others yet. But I am ‘getting’ there, am I not?” He opens his eyes again, throwing Tetora a deliberate look that spelled out, even without being vocalized, _“see, like right now.”_

“Ossu, right,” Tetora answers, not without any remnant reservation. If he were, let’s say, to have a discussion on all the turbulence he was feeling inside, it would probably be with Kuro. Tetora doesn’t know Kanata quite that well yet; even if Kanata were his senior in his unit; it would be comparable at this point of time to talking to a near-stranger! But if Tetora couldn’t even let Kuro, of all people, in on the whole issue... 

Tetora decides to take his chances. “Say… Shinkai-senpai, did you ever… D’you ever think about what you would do, if you weren’t in _RYUSEITAI_?”

Kanata shakes his head. “ _RYUSEITAI_ is ‘blue’, like the sea. Though it was ‘hard’ sometimes to see the color, I have not ‘thought’ too much about ‘other units’.”

“I don’t really get what you mean.”

Kanata sinks an inch deeper into the water. Then, suddenly— “Are you ‘worried’ about the live?”

Tetora freezes up. He hadn’t really thought about the upcoming live, being so preoccupied with other problems, but as he thinks about it now, new worry blooms in his stomach. “No... well, yeah, maybe. I mean, you saw how we did on the last live.”

“Were you ‘happy’ back then?”

“Of course not!” Tetora’s face darkens alongside the clouds above. _Why would I be happy with that!_ “Didn’t I say it was a mess? And I even—”

Tetora sags down further, just like how Kanata had submerged his shoulders into the water a minute ago. Down, down, down. Where no one could see the hole in his hollow core. “I blew up at Taichou, didn’t I.”

“Chiaki?”

_I was the worst, wasn’t I…?”_

“Chiaki… may be your ‘senior’, Tetora…”

_I go on about how everyone else was flailing, but what about myself?!_

“—but that does not mean he is ‘experienced’. There is still some ‘child’ in him.”

Tetora looks up.

Something light, like soda pop bubbles, lifts up within him; Tetora breathes in and sits himself back up. That feeling almost overflows into some sort of lame laugh, but Tetora still has some lingering confusion. Somehow… Tetora gets where Kanata is going with his words. Maybe this was Shinkai-senpai’s weird way of reassurance?

“Shinkai-senpai,” he says, some tension leaving his voice, “is it really okay to be talking about him like that?”

Kanata smiles. “We are all ‘children’ of the sea, Tetora,” going back to being incomprehensible, but Shinkai-senpai had been right—Tetora _did_ feel somewhat better after talking with someone. Even though their lines of conversation didn’t really match.

Tetora shivers. “It’s getting cold… ah! Hey!” He bolts up. “Shinkai-senpai, you’ll catch a cold like that, you know? Plus, we’re going to be late for practice! Come on.”

Kanata takes Tetora’s hand as he gets up, his blazer dripping with water. “You and ‘Chiaki’ are similar people after all,” he frowns, “but I do not want to hear him ‘lecture’ if I get a cold, so…”

“Me ‘n Taichou?” Tetora makes an odd face.

“Yes…” Kanata continues to talk while the two walk to the practice room, “You should both ‘slow down’ sometimes. Like ‘bathe’ in the fountain for a while… I keep telling Chiaki this, but he does not listen.”

“Taichou isn’t entirely wrong on this one you know,” Tetora says. _Causing trouble for all of us…_ “—wait, don’t tell me you always do this so Taichou can take a break…?!”

Kanata’s expression is cryptic. When he talks again, he avoids where the topic was going. “You see, both of you ‘rush’... It is hard, swimming against the current…” _but_ , Kanata looks at Tetora’s side profile, wondering. Unsure just how to continue—Chiaki is better at these kinds of situations, Kanata thinks. Better at connecting, talking, motivating people.

“...but Chiaki has me to ‘catch him’ when he falls, so.”

Tetora blinks, puzzled.

 _Tetora… still is a child._ Kanata stares off into the distance, but Tetora’s slowed-down footsteps besides him pull Kanata’s mind back. The stars in the sky haven’t shown their faces yet, but when Kanata asks his next question, it’s directed to them.

_Can I… protect them? This peace; these children, this time?_

_protect to the end (the blue flames)_

“So, it’s important,” Kanata continues, as if no time had passed at all from the last sentence to the next, “that Tetora can ‘find’ people like that, too.”

Tetora’s face remains drawn in confusion, but something about the way he says, “Yeah… Thanks, Shinkai-senpai,” tells Kanata that Tetora must have registered something in those words. 

Tetora reaches to open the door to the practice room.

“Ooh, Tetora-kun, you’re here at last!” Shinobu, coming towards them from the back of the room, ushers them in. “Please come and help us—ah, Shinkai-dono, you’re wet, de gozaru! I will promptly go get a towel!”

“The ‘hero’ is late?” Kanata says.

“Ossu, Sengoku-kun!” Tetora greets. “Sorry I’m late!” Tetora surveys the small room, spotting something moving in the corner—oh, it’s just Midori sulking—Tetora scratches his head. “Is Taichou not here?”

Shinobu returns with the towel. “I don’t know where he is, de gozaru; this is bad! Midori-kun and I have already searched around the premises, but… He seems to be hiding really well, almost as skillful as a ninja!”

Midori grumbles. “I didn’t want to be here anyway… but if not even Morisawa-senpai is here, there’s even less of a point… good for me though, that means I can just go home, right?”

“Midori-kun, did you check the hallways?” Tetora asks.

“Sigh… why do we have to look for him again?”

Though Tetora gets that Midori is just complaining, a part of him thinks the same thing: really, if Tetora could will it, he’d rather not have to face Chiaki right now. This was almost a stroke of luck! And yet…

...that’s not what a man among men…

_That’s not what RYUSEI BLACK…_

… would do, right?

“The five of us, we’re _RYUSEITAI_ , right?” Tetora says, noticing he sounds very much like Taichou (and paying it no mind, squeezing that thought down.) “It’s frustrating, but we can’t start anything until we find him, yeah?”

The corners of Midori’s eyebrows become pointed, and he sighs in a _totally unsatisfied, thanks_ way. But then, “We checked the hallways, but… not the classrooms.”

“What are we waiting for then!” Tetora runs out the practice room and into the hallway, disappearing from close view. The ones left in the practice room look at each other, not quite registering the speed that events were playing out.

Then Shinobu gets up, following Tetora into the hall. “Don’t run, Tetora-kun! You might get scolded, de gozaru.” _From experience_ , Shinobu thinks dryly. He checks the nearest classroom on the right. No sign of anyone.

“There’s no one here, either,” Tetora says, head poking into the classroom on the left. 

“The third year ‘halls’ are that way,” Kanata points out, walking at a leisurely pace.

“Ooh, that’s right! He should probably be in his classroom, then!” Tetora and Shinobu take off, skirting the corner.

“Some of the classrooms have their doors closed…” Midori follows the other two first years in the hall, lagging behind in stride. “Also, class ended a long time ago, so why…”

“Ah!” It’s Shinobu, a quiet exclamation.

“Did you find him?” Tetora skids to a stop.

“Shh!” As Tetora peeks into the classroom, everything starts falling into place— _”Don’t worry, I’ll take care of the rest!”_ Chiaki’s voice echoes, a far-off distant sound. 

_As if you made it any easier not to worry...!_ Tetora thinks, rushing into the room to get a better look at Chiaki’s sleeping form, head resting on his forearms.

The long sheet of paper resting on the desk leg slips down and unfurls when Tetora touches it. There are markings, big bold scribbles, in the once blank spaces between the five-colored marker streaks. Notes, and arrows, and sketches. Markers are littered beside Chiaki’s bag, one of them still uncapped. Underneath Chiaki’s arms is a notebook that’s open to a scribbled-on page. _The plan for the live,_ Tetora’s heart drops, a dormant anger waking up for just a second before it fizzes out to guilt.

 _“For our dreams, Nagumo,”_ —again, that voice. One look at the mess, at the notebook whose pages must have contained sleepless nights and witnessed a deluge of ideas upon ideas pour forth: it was like a fight had occurred. Perhaps a stupid one, but a noble one, to some extent.

A dream worth fighting for. Tetora’s almost ashamed, thinking back to his conversation with Kuro in the dojo. Here he was, saying bold things like “I want this to work,” but not doing anything to make it happen?

Midori picks up the uncapped marker. “Geez… you keep on telling me to not be late to practice, but now you’re the late one…?” He briefly surveys the notes on the margin, the markers on the ground. “You’re so unfair, you know… always like this…”

“He could’ve called us,” Tetora says, picking up the rest of the markers. Kanata echoes the thought with a “Silly Chiaki...” but Tetora can’t really meet his senior’s eyes when Kanata says this; there’s a glint of something sad stowed away, almost an understanding of some sort.

“Should I ‘punish’ him then?”

“Shinkai-dono, please do not use force, de gozaru!”

Kanata freezes, mid-chop, and puts his hand down. “Heheh~ I was just ‘kidding’, so it is ‘okay’.” He looks at the notebook, then at Chiaki, face growing somewhat somber. “I did ‘work’ on this with you, didn’t I? Chiaki. But yet you still ‘continued’ to fight so hard... Mm~ This is ‘no good’. Even though we have already ‘reached’ peaceful times...”

Tetora’s “Huh? What d’you mean by that?” clashes with Midori’s “If no one’s gonna punish him…” and altogether, collides with a voice in the hallway: “What are you all doing here?”

Midori shrinks into himself in surprise, putting the marker in his hand down—and away from Chiaki’s face. Tetora bristles in anticipation; Shinobu’s suddenly on guard. Kanata just smiles, though it’s a wan smile Tetora is just ever-so-slightly concerned about. “Ahh... The ‘peace’ has been broken,” Kanata says.

Keito crosses his arms. “You do know that classes are already over. Don’t you have unit practice? What are you doing, loitering around.”

“We… we’re just here to fetch Taichou-dono, de gozaru…”

“Hm?” Keito walks over. The rest of the first years could only watch, soundlessly. “Oh, of course.”

_Of course?_

“Morisawa, you need to stop staying up late. Or at least be mindful enough to stay awake in class. Honestly, as a senior you should be putting more thought into what image you bring to your juniors. And you, too, Shinkai. You’re the vice-captain of your unit, so show some responsibility, too.”

Tetora couldn’t help but tense up. He’s had a few encounters with Keito before, for sure—after all, Keito was a member of _Akatsuki_ , and Tetora had been able to talk to him whenever he came with Kuro. But, caught in a sticky situation like this, getting into trouble like this, it was different. _This is the Student Council Vice-president we’re talking about!_ one half of his brain argued. The other half was too preoccupied, zeroing in on each one of _RYUSEITAI_ ’s faces. None of them were moving; it was like they were stuck in stasis, the five of them amid all the work splayed across desk and floor alike.

_Move, Tetora!_

_“You’re a hero, aren’t you!”_

_I’m not a hero,_ Tetora replies in his head: not that Chiaki, sleeping or not, could hear him. _I’m not even fit enough to be a leader, but I..._

Tetora gulps, and steps forward. “We’re sorry!”

Is this even the right thing to do?

Probably a question that will forever be left unanswered. Didn’t Taishou keep telling him to take it slow, think things over? Even Shinkai-senpai said something similar, and yet, Tetora didn’t listen, again.

But…!

But he couldn’t just stay put and do nothing! That would be even more shameful, wouldn’t it?

A noise, a footstep. Beside him, he’s suddenly greeted with a familiar presence: Shinobu glances at Tetora for a split second before facing forward. “This won’t—This won’t happen again, de gozaru.”

_Sengoku-kun..._

The same nervousness that had fought Shinobu back then, back to that first live, is present now, as Shinobu looks up to Keito (or tries to, for the matter—Tetora catches Shinobu’s gaze flickering to the floor.) But suddenly, Tetora comes to realize something he’d missed. That nervousness, Shinobu had quelled, turned it into something greater—

—and Midori, him too; Tetora expected him to cower and stow himself away into a corner but from his periphery he sees that Midori had _moved_ , subtly. Completely blocking Chiaki’s desk from view.

“Do not ‘worry’,” Kanata speaks up, looking at Keito with a leveled look, “I will ‘protect’ you children from the temple guy’s ‘eyeglasses glare’, so…”

If there was a name for a mixed emotion of vague displeasure and amusement, Keito’s face emanated it. “Pardon?”

“We will ‘tidy’ all this up, so you do not have to ‘stay’ any longer. You must have ‘other’ things to do; it is best to let this ‘flow’ away, like water, _puka, puka._ ”

Keito lets a sigh escape his lips. “I don’t suppose I can argue with that,” and with closed eyes and one hand on his forehead he gestures to the mess with a nonchalant wave of a hand. “Get this all cleaned up and go to your unit practice. I better not see you all in the halls afterwards.” Then, at Tetora, “Don’t apologize so easily. It’s not like you’re to blame, after all.”

But it _had_ been. Somewhat. Since Chiaki had been fighting so hard for his, and their sakes, to make this next live come true. “Well, Taichou’s been working real hard on our next live, so we can’t help but kinda be in this, too.” 

“Hmm,” Keito says tersely, and nothing more. Tetora dips his head down as the vice-president leaves the room.

A collective sigh. Tetora lets out a bated breath; lulls his beating heart to a stop. “Whew… that was kinda scary,” he breathes, “it’s hard to talk to him not as a member of _Akatsuki_ , y’know?”

“I feel the same way, Tetora-kun!” Shinobu says, also letting out a breath in relief. “Though I have been in the Student Council room on multiple occasions, except for Isara-dono, it is still hard to face the other council members, de gozaru.”

“But it’s all thanks to Shinkai-senpai that he’s gone now! We should probably get going, right? Maybe we could help out somehow, get a head-start on this plan for the live? Like if I asked Taishou about the costumes...”

Kanata smiles. “Heh~ It is ‘nice’ to be praised, and all. Tetora did a ‘good job’ too, so you should be ‘rewarded’. Here, a ‘dried mackerel’~”

Tetora squints at the dried fish on Kanata’s palm. “Ehh, Shinkai-senpai, where did you get that from?!”

“Ooh, that’s right, Tetora-kun!” Shinobu nods in agreement. “You were the one who stepped out first. That was very impressive, de gozaru!”

“Yeah…” Midori joins in. “If I had to face off against someone like that, I don’t think I could do it…”

“I didn’t really do anything,” Tetora scratches his cheek, a bit bashful. 

“But…” Midori says, “It was something, right…?”

(The hole in his heart shrinks, just a little.)

“Hey, should we wake Taichou up?” Tetora switches the subject. It wasn’t a switch done out of hastiness, nor one built on a foundation of uneasiness. It was more like he was ready to move forward—along with everyone else (and maybe, somewhere within himself, too.) “Actually, it’s weird that he hasn’t woken up yet; we were being noisy, weren’t we? He must’ve been completely drained.”

“Didn’t I ‘offer’ to do it before, Tetora?”

“Shinkai-senpai, he might die if you karate-chop his head like that…”

“Being woken up forcefully sucks…” Midori starts, “but this guy has been rea~lly troublesome lately… and he wakes me up in the morning all the time, too… Maybe I should just…”

“Ah, Midori-kun, you should put that away, too…”

“It’s not like the marker is permanent, though…?”

Kanata picks up the blue marker. “Midori, let’s ‘work’ hard together, okay~?”

 _It’s so surreal,_ Tetora thinks. Here he was, chasing desperately after an image, a world where he felt less small, a place where he could get stronger. He’d been having all these doubts, even so recent as earlier today, when he had that talk with Taishou in the dojo. But somehow, looking at these people… his _comrades_ …? who accepted him, no matter how weak he was...

“Shinkai-dono, should we really be… ah, Tetora-kun, help me out here!”

Tetora rolls the marker in the palm of his hand. It’s a black marker, and his other hand held the cap.

_Yeah… moving forward._

☆

 **_stellar flares:_ ** _when stars emit sudden bright flashes due to magnetic energy contained within their atmospheres being released_

On the day of the live, Chiaki calls them out early.

“These will be the outfits that we’re going to be wearing! Kiryu did a good job on them again, didn’t he!”

“I guess… but it’s even flashier than my current _GREEN_ outfit… sigh…”

Tetora takes his outfit in both hands. It _is_ somewhat flashy, especially with the five-colored streaks, shooting star trails, decorating the front. Red, blue, violet, yellow, green. But it’s Taishou’s work, and he had to admit—

—the different colors looked amazing against the black of the outfit.

“It would look even ‘better’ if it had the ‘water hose’ incorporated in it,” Kanata remarks, head drooping slightly, “but it is very ‘blue’. I cannot complain, can I?”

“Haha, Kanata, that’s good, good! Though we couldn’t put the, ah, hose in, you did get to incorporate something water-like into the performance, right!”

“That is not ‘real’ water, Chiaki, but it will have to ‘make’ do.”

“Right… the ribbons,” Midori lifts up the blue tissue paper with an air of annoyance, “this is gonna be embarrassing, isn’t it…?”

Chiaki grins, placing a hand on Midori’s shoulder. “Now, now, don’t say that! We also added in those star-shaped pillows as props on the stage, so cheer up!”

Midori shrugs the hand right off. “Yeah, they’re props, so I can’t hug them until the live is over… isn’t that cruel…? How depressing…”

“Water…” Kanata takes the tissue paper from Midori’s frustration-induced, ever-tightening grip. “Star-shaped pillows… hehe, Midori, now they are ‘starfish’.”

“Starfish, huh…”

“Oh, would you look at the time!” Chiaki exclaims. “Alright, my comrades, are you all ready?”

“Ossu! I’m all fired up!” Tetora chimes in. Though their last live had been close to disastrous, he had a good feeling about this time—everyone had put in hours of practice, after all. And though it was still leagues away from the coordination that the top units in Yumenosaki had, there was definitely some improvement, Tetora reckons. Plus, they’d worked hard at this, all of them… Chiaki had gotten most of the details all planned out, but the rest of them had tried their best to put in their share of the work afterwards. 

“Everyone remembers the drill, right?” Chiaki goes on to explain. “The choreo is a bit tricky, I’ve got to say! I myself practiced Sengoku’s ‘water jutsu’ a bunch of times, haha! But all of us practiced a lot, so I’m sure it’ll be great!”

“I am glad that you practiced it so much, Taichou-dono…!” Shinobu clasps his hands together. “I will also try my very best, de gozaru, to deliver the full impact of the choreography to the audience!”

“Yes,” Kanata says, “I have also ‘practiced’ my entrance many times, _puka, puka_.” He holds up the tissue ribbon.

“Tetora-kun, you just had to add those karate stances into the choreography, huh… But…” Midori sighs resignedly. “I guess I’ve gotten a hang of them now, so it might be a waste if I don’t do it properly at least once…?”

“That’s the spirit, Takamine! You should do that more often!”

“How annoying…”

“Actually, aren’t we forgetting something, Taichou?” Tetora points at himself, still wearing the practice outfit. “We haven’t changed into the outfit yet…”

“Ohh! Good catch, Nagumo! We can’t go out there without transforming first, can we!” Chiaki quickly dashes into a darkened corner of the backstage, and with a _“henshin!”_ , comes back out again, fully changed. When the other members come back after changing, Chiaki nods in approval.

“Mm! Let’s go, _RYUSEITAI_!”

“Yeah!” they chorus, and—the show was on.

Things started off without a hitch. Chiaki had introduced himself with a heroic pose and his equally heroic catchphrase. Kanata went in surrounded by blue tissue paper flying about—a little silly-looking observing it all from backstage, but the audience seemed to enjoy it. Shinobu, with just a little bit of initial hesitation, appeared onto the stage so quickly and surreptitiously, it was as if he’d materialized from thin air. Midori walked onto the stage with considerably more hesitation than Shinobu had taken, but he was doing all the poses—and Tetora himself, starting his entrance off with a high kick— _everything’s going well. That’s good._

Their singing, too, was going surprisingly okay. Tetora had started the song off strong, and Shinobu had followed suit. Everyone was sweating, but there were smiles on each one of their faces. With how everything was going, if they kept this up, _RYUSEITAI_ could make it through without a problem, right…?

Then, Chiaki stops singing mid-lyric.

How a stage, once so loud, could suddenly be reduced to utter stillness in a heartbeat, was truly a rare event to experience. Even stranger to witness the loudest voice in the group go quiet. Unnerving, to feel the chill from the audience, so many pairs of eyes boring into them, echoing surprise, and disappointment. Tetora could almost hear it, the _this is so disappointing…_ in everyone’s heads.

“Taichou, what’s wrong?” Tetora whispers, eyeing Chiaki while dread creeps up within him like a vine scaling up a wall. And just when things were going so well, too!

Chiaki opens his mouth, but instead of an explanation, it’s the next line of the song, the last of his verse. He’s belting it out as loud as he can. “Keep singing, Nagumo, don’t worry!” he whispers back, after he finishes his verse, “it’s just my mic stopped working on me all of a sudden, but we need to keep singing!”

“G-Got it,” Tetora says. He opens his mouth, too, but instead of the chorus, his breath catches.

(Blank, blank, blank.)

_Think!_

(Nothing at all.)

_Why can’t I remember the lyrics now?_

(The sound of nothing is suspiciously loud. Loud, like heartbeats jumping out of his chest.)

Even without a microphone, Chiaki’s singing is louder than Tetora’s moment of silence. The others, they’d gone ahead with the chorus, too. _I should probably re-join them somewhere,_ Tetora thinks, listening for a good place to jump back in, _but my choreo is already wrecked… Argh, this is so frustrating! I’m so disappointed in myself!_

“...Tetora… is everything alright?”

Shinkai-senpai’s voice. Tetora’s head gravitates to it, even though he doesn’t want to look at them right now. “Did your ‘mic’ go out, too?”

“Ah no,” Tetora winces as it’s broadcasted to the audience, loud and clear. His heart plummets ten levels lower. He takes off his earpiece, tempted to just throw it off-stage. “No, my mic’s fine! I just… sorry,” he lapses. Then, “Can we keep singing? I can still go on if I find the right place to come in!”

“It’s okay, to ‘falter’ sometimes,” Kanata says, and behind them, the backtrack fades off. “Even I am still ‘learning’. But you are ‘strong’, Tetora, so you will surely ‘make’ it.”

“Well said, Kanata.” Chiaki says. With the backtrack paused, Chiaki’s voice is more penetrating than before, and therefore, even harder for Tetora to listen to without feeling a pang of frustration and guilt scrunch up his insides. “Nagumo, don’t worry about it. Like Kanata said, we’re all still learning! I’ve made mistakes in the past that I’m not proud of, either. But it’s a matter of getting back up, no matter how torn and tattered our bodies are. _RYUSEITAI_ ,” he turns to look at the others, “start from the beginning again!”

“We have to do it all over again…?” Midori whines. “But we already did it once… though, I’m glad I can finally get rid of this tissue paper stuck on my pants… ugh… that must’ve looked so embarrassing…”

“Midori-kun, it’s okay, de gozaru! It doesn’t look out of place with the color scheme!”

“That kinda… makes it even worse, you know…”

“But doesn’t it sound unbalanced, singing like this?” Shinobu asks. “I mean, because Taichou’s mic doesn’t work anymore.”

“No, it’s good, Sengoku-kun…” Midori plucks the tissue ribbon off with a frown. “It’s nice for his voice to be quieter for once…”

Chiaki nods. “You make a good point, Sengoku! Hm… How about we do this then?” 

Tetora can only watch, a little dumbfounded, as each one of _RYUSEITAI_ ’s members took off their earpieces in solidarity, put them to the side.

“It’ll be a bit quieter from now on, so you guys have to sing louder, alright?” Chiaki nods to Tetora. “Nagumo, you remember how the lyrics go again? And the choreo?”

“Ossu... I start off with a closed fist, and Sengoku-kun does a kick when he comes in on the next line. And I got the chorus now!”

Chiaki claps Tetora on the shoulder, satisfied with the response. “Nagumo, actually, can I borrow your earpiece for a sec?”

Puzzled, Tetora hands it over. “‘Course, but what for, Taichou?”

Chiaki turns to face the crowd, and speaks. “Everyone! Thank you for coming to our live, first of all! Now, you all know that as _RYUSEITAI_ , we are a unit of—that’s right, little girl in the front row! We’re heroes! But even as heroes ourselves, seeing everyone here today, everyone’s faces…” Chiaki beams. “You are the real heroes, you know! Each and every one of you.”

There is a hint of sadness Tetora can’t really place, behind the childish sparkle of Chiaki’s eyes, looking out to the audience. Even if he could name it, Tetora couldn’t bring himself to pay much thought to it, mind still stuck in a never-ending playback of the past few minutes, everything that had gone wrong playing over and over and over. But… he had practiced! All those hours, all that sweat, and he couldn’t even get it right when it came to the real deal? And wasn’t whatever Chiaki was doing now just damage control? Just _thinking_ about it made Tetora feel like a let-down...

“—sorry about that! Of course, being heroes, we don’t let such troubles knock us down! So we’re going to go from the top again, this time without microphones. Is everyone still on board?”

There’s clapping, clapping that tugs Tetora back to his senses.

“Thank you, everyone!” Chiaki turns back, motioning with his hands for everyone to get back into position. “ _RYUSEITAI_ , time to get back up! Let’s go, heroes!” He takes a moment to direct a look to Tetora, then a nod, as if to say, _you ready?_

Maybe not, but that’s not an option, is it?

Tetora goes through the motions of the first steps of the choreo in his head. Without meeting Chiaki’s gaze, he nods back.

The backtrack fires up again, and Tetora begins, putting out a firm fist forward. This time around was harder to perform—one part being that none of them were singing with mics anymore—but pushing through the song, giving it his all, Tetora slowly got back into it. His voice, strained but crystal clear and full of energy. His movements, disjointed with the rest of the group at times, but powerful, and told a story of their own. His emotions—though at first his chest had felt hollow and his movements robotic, somewhere along the line a wave of relief swept over him, along with a strange joy—

 _Should I really be happy with this?_ he wonders, as the song draws to a close.

But when the clapping begins, when the smiles from the crowd begin to shine, and…

(Tetora watches the rest of _RYUSEITAI_ break into smiles of their own. Even Midori, who had a constant frown built into his features; even Shinobu, who was so scared of facing the audience before. Kanata’s smile lit up his entire face, so far as to decorate the edges of his eyes, too… and Chiaki…)

 _Is this what we were fighting for…?_ Tetora feels the corners of his lips lift up, unconsciously swayed by the overwhelming emotions tackling his inner self. _Is this the justice, the dream that we fought for, together?_

Because, he can’t deny it.

It feels like a victory.

☆

“I thought this was over…?”

Chiaki shakes his head. “We’ll be doing one last part, Takamine! See, you all had so many good ideas and talked so fervently about your interests that I couldn’t bear to not do anything with them! So we’re going to talk a bit to the audience about what our passions are, and the like! It’ll be fun, I promise!”

“Again, Morisawa-senpai, your definition of ‘fun’ is something I’ll never get… I just want to go home… this wasn’t even in the schedule?”

“Midori-kun, please don’t leave yet, de gozaru!” Shinobu tugs at Midori’s sleeve. “Though, I am also nervous, to be talking about ninjas in front of strangers, but… It is something I like, no? And I want more people to love ninjas too, so it won’t be that difficult to talk about… I hope.”

“Sigh, I’m not leaving… if I leave, Morisawa-senpai will hold those star plushies hostage… I won’t be able to take them home…”

“Midori-kun,” Tetora interjects, “Sengoku-kun. I can go first if you want!”

“Haha! Taking the initiative, _RYUSEI BLACK?_ Good for you! Very well, Nagumo, you can go first.” Chiaki glances at Kanata. “Kanata?”

“I also don’t ‘object’,” Kanata says, then does his signature _puka, puka_.

“Ah, I didn’t mean ‘very first’...” Tetora clears his throat. “I mean, ossu! Thank you, Taichou, Shinkai-senpai.”

“Go on, then,” Chiaki ushers Tetora towards the open stage, towards the audience. “Do your best, hero!”

The audience is still when Tetora gets out there. Tetora himself can’t move, hit by a sudden inability to speak. _What do I even say to these kids?_ he thinks. Especially these kids, some of them still hooked on IVs, others with casts and in wheelchairs. Would it be weird, maybe even condescending, to talk about karate? But would they even understand Tetora’s dream of becoming a “man among men”?

“The black flames are the mark of diligence! _RYUSEI BLACK,_ Nagumo Tetora!” At least, starting off was easy with a pre-ordained catchphrase. “Taichou… That is, _RYUSEI RED_ , told us to talk about our dreams and stuff, ossu! So…”

Someone in the audience smiles at him, as if to say, _go on, I’m listening._

Tetora breathes out. “My dream, is to get stronger! But, you see, it’s not just about physical strength. It’s about having a strong heart, too. So!”

He’s feeling it now, the full vigor. It’s almost euphoric.

“I’m gonna keep getting up, no matter what! It won’t be easy, ‘cause there’s so many bumps on the road, some of them so tough they can give your resolve fatal wounds, but… I wanna become a man among men someday. And to do that,”

 _Right, this is it. This was_ it. So focused on the end goal, he’d forgotten there were others, too—by his side, even in the audience down below—who were also fighting. Everyone might have been fighting for different reasons, fighting different things, even fighting differently, but when Tetora had messed up on the lyrics… when Chiaki’s earpiece malfunctioned… Each of them had fallen alone, and yet, none of them were alone in standing up.

(This kind of unity… was a strength in itself.)

“With the rest of my unit-mates with me, I won’t stop trying. That’s right, I’ll try my best!”

“I believe in you!” someone pipes up from the audience, followed by clapping. And then more clapping, and a few cheers.

“T-Thank you!” Tetora signs off, as he steps back into the darkness of backstage, into Chiaki’s praises of “good job!”, (with the hole in his heart just a tad bit… fuller. Something of substance.) 

“That was pretty good, Tetora-kun,” Midori says, as Tetora joins the first years once again.

“It was kinda hard to start, but it was good to get there in the end, y’know? And talking to people about stuff you like really isn’t that difficult once you start, like Sengoku-kun said! You should go next, Midori-kun.”

“Um… I’ll pass, no thank you…”

“Come on, Midori-kun!” Tetora pushes Midori’s back.

“You can do it, Midori-kun!” Shinobu joins in.

“ _Ughhhh_ ,” Midori groans, in the quite possibly longest- _ugh_ ever. “The green flames…” he says, as he reaches the stage, “something something… healing power of mascot characters... my name is Midori, so I’m… _RYUSEI GREEN…_ Takamine Midori...”

“Speak up, Takamine, you don’t have your mic on, remember!”

“Morisawa-senpai, please stop talking… Um, I like mascot characters, and all… that’s about it. Sorry it’s not as interesting as Tetora-kun’s dream…”

Midori pauses. “Is that…” he says, pointing at a little girl in the audience. “Is that a mascot character in the shape of a lemon slice…?”

The girl nods, hugging the plush harder.

“Wahh, it’s so cute… I’ve never seen it before… Can you tell me where you got it from, after the show…?” 

The girl nods again.

“Uwahh, thank you thank you~” With renewed interest, Midori starts talking again. “Mascot characters are the best, aren’t they… They’re so cute, and soft to the touch… One day, I wish to fill my bedroom full of them… Hm? You want to hear me talk about my dream, just like how Tetora-kun did…? Well, I already said that, I don’t really have that kind of dream, but...”

 _...but this…_ feeling, standing on the stage now—and even when singing, too, with the rest of _RYUSEITAI_ , _it isn’t… too bad, maybe…_

_…maybe it’s one that’s worth risking your life for…?_

“I’ll keep shining, even for a little while longer, and maybe… No, I believe that one day, I’ll find it... ♪”

“See, I knew you could do it, Takamine!” is what he’s met with when he rejoins the others. Deflecting Chiaki’s voice with his back turned against the source of the clamor, Midori looks at Shinobu. “Shinobu-kun, do you want to go next…?”

“I… I wouldn’t mind, de gozaru; in fact, I had already made up my mind to go before you, Midori-kun,”

“Huh…? Then why didn’t you say so back then…?!”

“—but Shinkai-dono just left to the stage, so.”

“Wait, since when did he…?”

“The blue flames are the mark of mystery! I have come from the blue sea~ _RYUSEI BLUE,_ Shinkai Kanata!” Kanata looks out to the sea of people, and smiles. “Like from my ‘introduction’, I love the ‘ocean’, _puka puka._ And I also love the color ‘blue’, because the ocean, and water, are ‘blue’...”

 _…and so is loneliness,_ but... 

_I am no longer alone anymore, am I?_

“Being _RYUSEI BLUE_ … reminds me of the ocean, too… so I am ‘happy’. Is everyone ‘happy’ today as well? I hope that ‘today’ will become a ‘beloved’ memory for everyone, too… So I will ‘wish’ something from you all. To please, cherish and ‘protect’ these memories, and eat more fish.

“Thank you, for coming to our ‘live’~” Kanata switches places with Shinobu, who’s already stationed near the opening. “Shinobu, it is ‘your’ turn now.”

Shinobu un-glues his gaze from Shinkai-dono, and to the crowd. Unwillingly, his heartbeat had skyrocketed; his palms all sweaty. _Don’t lose focus, don’t lose focus…!_

“T-The yellow flames are the mark of hope, a single miracle shining in the darkness! _RYUSEI YELLOW,_ Sengoku Shinobu…!” The sun is brighter than he’d imagined; the crowd felt larger than before?!... but _…_ “As you might have noticed from the choreo, I am a ninja, de gozaru. Being an amazing ninja and improving my skills is my dream…”

Shinobu takes a quick peek at the audience. None of them were laughing; in fact, they all seemed interested in what he was saying.

“It is something very liberating when you have something you really love,” he continues, growing steadier, “and ninjas was that something to me. Because I was able to revive myself even when I fell down, because of this love, de gozaru. So I want everyone to know about ninjas, and I—I hope that you can love ninjas just as much, too… Thank you…”

Clapping ensued, and Shinobu returned backstage feeling lighter than ever. 

“You did well, Sengoku! Ah, is it my turn to go on stage?” Chiaki clenches his fist. “It was hard to wait this long, to be completely honest, but my turn has finally arrived, hahaha!”

“Just go on stage already,” Midori sighs, hugging the star plushies closer to his chest, “so we can get this over with… and I can finally go home…”

“Haha! No need to say it twice!” And Chiaki heads off, showing his face once again to the audience.

It’s a bit hard, this audience—harder than almost any other audience he had to sing in front of. Chiaki had been like this once, too. Hooked to an IV, lying in bed as his body struggled not to go out. But it was because of his unwavering belief, his love for heroes and his desperate fight to become one himself… “The red flames are the mark of justice! Burning bright red, the sun of life! _RYUSEI RED,_ Morisawa Chiaki! Thank you, everyone, for coming again! Just like how Kanata put it, I hope everyone had fun today and enjoyed the show!

“Now, I’ve already talked about my interests. I love heroes! And heroes are part of my dream! I can go on about this, but I decided, I’m going to talk about something else I really cherish, and that is our unit, _RYUSEITAI_!

“I’m _RYUSEI RED,_ again!” Red, the color of justice: a color that before, Chiaki had doubts on wearing. Still has doubts wearing. “But of course, _RED_ can’t fight without comrades! Everyone, it’s great to have friends that support you, right? You see, I feel the same way, and that is why I am blessed.”

In the past, when everything was stained red and the path ahead was so unclear, even Chiaki had a hard time believing it. But truly,

(Tetora’s strength. Shinobu’s passion. Midori’s breakthroughs. Kanata’s unwavering trust, keeping everything in balance. Together, the future, the path ahead, feels so, so _bright_.) 

—he believes he’s found something more precious than anything in the world. 

“Along with my comrades, we are _RYUSEITAI_ ! Together, we can overcome many tribulations, fight and win many things—and you all, you will surely do the same thing if you work together, too! You may ask, ‘who is _RYUSEITAI_ fighting for? Well, we’re fighting for the people currently trapped in darkness. The people who can’t fight, who have lost the will to fight—yes, we are _RYUSEITAI,_ five-colored shooting stars! To tell you to keep fighting—as shooting stars we’ll shine through that darkness, as a reminder to keep fighting! We’ll grant your wishes, that your dream will come true! To me, to win against evil, to triumph against all challenges life throws your way, and to make everyone smile—that’s justice!

“So, you tell me—what are _you_ fighting for?”

_i’m fighting for_

justice itself, (red, _vermillion red_ ) 

(As Chiaki finds himself among his comrades again, just one look at their faces, how much they resembled the happy faces of the children in the audience, and all these overwhelming feelings pouring out afterwards—something tells him that maybe, he’s finally found out what real justice feels like.)

_i’m fighting for_

a believing heart, (green, _emerald green_ )

(Even as Midori heads home with his prizes in tow, he’s still thinking back to the live… and something tells him that tomorrow won’t be such a bad day after all.)

_i’m fighting for_

our comrades, (yellow, _amber yellow_ )

(Though he’d trembled at first, Shinobu got his message through… And just like his unit members, who accepted him and didn’t judge him for loving ninjas, one of the audience members asked him more about ninjas after the live... It made him somewhat hopeful, about the Ninja Association next year.)

_i’m fighting for_

beloved thoughts, (blue, _aquamarine blue_ )

(Even with the tedious practice to prepare for the live, and the technical difficulties, and everything… Kanata acknowledges, happily, that this live was, indeed, a “happy memory” he’d made with the others.)

_i’m fighting for_

the people important to us, (black—ultraviolet, _iridium black._ )

☆

They’re on the beach, the five of them. After the third years’ graduation ceremony, Chiaki had insisted that everyone should go somewhere together—a sort of commemoration, or an after-party, perhaps. Though, as Tetora runs to keep up to Chiaki’s strides, it was more like another invitation to cry.

“Because I wanted us to all see the stars!” Chiaki had said. He didn’t add, “it’ll be fitting, to say our goodbyes as we watch the stars”, but everyone had sensed the unspoken sentiment, and in turn, became as quiet as the intent itself, and agreed to come. Chiaki had also brought fireworks—funny, how everything felt sad now; even fireworks reminded Tetora of that one time _RYUSEITAI_ had performed at a festival, how he’d beaten the _taiko_ drums.

“You said you had something to say to me alone, didn’t you, Nagumo?” Chiaki’s facing him, that silly smile forever etched on his face. (Tetora might miss that smile, but he doesn’t let anyone know.) “Are you going to fight me for the _RED_ position now? Hahaha! Like I promised before, I accepted your challenge from the very beginning, so even though it’s time, I won’t let this title go that easily and call you _RYUSEI RED_ juuust yet.”

“I’m _RYUSEI BLACK_ !” Tetora cries out. Chiaki’s taken aback. “I’m still _RYUSEI BLACK_ for now,” _and I’m proud of it._ Black, the mark of diligence—black, with the never-failing strength of iron, charging forward. “But also violet, heheh~” Tetora scratches the back of his neck meekly. Violet—the wavelength that stores the most energy, an ultraviolet, hidden power coursing through his veins.

Chiaki smiles, and his smiles have always been genuine but something about this one ached so much of pure joy, just like the one Tetora had seen on the White Day stage.

_Isn’t this… the justice we’ve all been fighting for? To make someone’s dream, to make the dreams of those important to us, come true?_

And what they were fighting for, their dreams—

_(Chiaki's smile, right now, shines as much as the tears glinting off the spotlights: a lip-biting, shaking smile that can't be contained in the limited space the White Day stage offers.)_

—wasn't it for the same thing? To make that one person, even just that _one_ person, smile?

“But you’re also red,” Chiaki continues.

Tetora stares, really stares, at Chiaki, with a gaping mouth he’s not proud of. “H-huh? Didn’t you just say that you weren’t letting it go without a fight? Well, yeah, next year I will—ah, if you bestow the color to me, of course—”

“Remember your _RYUSEI BLACK_ outfit, Nagumo?”

Not quite comprehending, and yet his breath as still as if a stone had caught in his windpipe, he nods, soundlessly. Above the horizon, the sky glows with the sun, an array of colors mingling together in harmony to put on a beautiful color-show, just for the five of them (or maybe, just them two).

Chiaki laughs, as he presses something into Tetora’s palm—the belt of _RYUSEI RED_ ’s uniform. “It looks just like yours, so this probably isn’t going to make much difference, is it, hahah! But remember the belt on _BLACK’s_ uniform?

_The world around them fades away, until it becomes one with the lull of the waves and the sparkling, bell-like laughter—until his world becomes only what’s reflected in Chiaki’s eyes._

“It was red.”

Tetora feels his heart swell.

(It fills up every hole he has in his heart, with iron as black as the night sky.)

And when, a year later, one of his juniors approaches him and asks, “I heard that the reason our unit started up again last year was because the leader saw a shooting star, wished on it, and it granted his wish. And you all stuck around, and the unit was so powerful because you believed in all that, right?”, Tetora simply smiles, and shakes his head.

“We’re _RYUSEITAI,_ ” he says, with a resoluteness he’s proud of, “—five-colored shooting stars.”

Maybe shooting stars had played a part of it. But more than that, it was everything they had fought together—the suffering, the pain, the struggle—and that hope they held in themselves and for the future, that had led up to something resembling _victory_ , and _justice_ , in the end. 

“We grant our own wishes.”

**Author's Note:**

> [carrd](https://kytaen.carrd.co) | [curiouscat](https://curiouscat.me/kytaen)
> 
> usually the endnotes are where i do author-ly rambles, but since this piece has **author's notes** , please check them out [here](https://privatter.net/p/4622168)!
> 
> thank you for reading! and thanks to the mods that made this zine work; they put a lot of effort into its execution!


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